NHS Capital Spending

Steve Darling Excerpts

Wednesday 4th March 2026 Westminster Hall

[Steve Darling (Torbay) (LD)]

What a pleasure it is to serve under you as chairman, Mr Western. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Bobby Dean) on securing this important debate. Sorting out Torbay hospital, the hospital that serves my constituency as well as the constituents of my hon. Friends the Members for South Devon (Caroline Voaden) and for Newton Abbot (Martin Wrigley), is my No. 1 priority as the Member of Parliament for Torbay.

I knew that the hospital was in a difficult place prior to my election, but as I began to immerse myself in the challenges facing it, I was shocked. I was shocked by what was effectively wanton vandalism—corporate vandalism, even—undertaken by the previous Conservative Government by making promises that they just could not keep. The vandalism—the fact that they chose not to invest—made it much harder to invest in the longer term and actually made it more costly. It is that old proverb: a stitch in time saves nine.

In Torbay we face some massive challenges. We have seen more than 700 sewage leaks at our hospital. These sewage leaks do not just happen in the corridors; they happen in clinical areas and affect wards where patients are. There have to be deep cleans, and there are delays for patients in getting on to lists and, most importantly, delays in supporting people who need medical interventions.

We heard from my colleague, my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington, that delays are occurring because of poor ventilation, and we have heard about the impacts—indeed, there have been very significant impacts in Torbay hospital. However, approaching the hospital, someone might think that the seventh cavalry was coming over the horizon—the tower block is wrapped in scaffolding, so it must be being sorted. However, the reality is that the £1 million scaffolding is there purely to stop bits of the building falling off and braining staff and members of the public as they go past. Having to spend so much of our NHS money just maintaining a crumbling building is not good. The Torbay and South Devon NHS foundation trust has some bids in with the Minister around the challenges in the tower block; I am sure she is considering those at the moment and I hope she will look upon them kindly.

I also want to reflect on what works well in Torbay hospital. I recently visited and saw some really exciting changes. There are millions of pounds-worth of investment in the emergency department, for example, which is really welcome. The daytime operations area, where people come in for a short period in the hospital, is calm and businesslike, which is what we want during hospital visits, but that is very different from other parts of the hospital, particularly for those people who suffer from cancer, for whom the offer is chaotic and situated all over the estate. Cancer sufferers deserve a better experience.

We have seen investment in the endoscopy unit, and 90% of patients are being seen within five weeks, which is a massive improvement. However, looking at the estate of Torbay hospital as a whole, 85% of it is not up to standard. The £350 million investment supports only half of the hospital.

We have also seen a toxic change to the spending power of this capital programme. We have seen Brexit, we have seen the pandemic, which has impacted on the spending power of capital programmes, and we have seen the war in Ukraine, which has seen building prices spiral. Some of the management in the hospital field say that, since the pandemic, the spending power of capital programmes has halved, so can the Minister tell us how the Government have taken account of the fact that money is going only half as far as it did historically?

In conclusion, Torbay is one of the most deprived communities in the country and the NHS often picks up the rough end of that. Only recently, a director told me she has patients who believe that living to their 60s is a good span of life. I am sure the Minister agrees that is not the aspiration we should have for our communities. In the south-west we have seen a lack of capital investment, whether in our railways or NHS infrastructure. I hope the Minister will tell us how the Government are planning to invest in the NHS in the south-west and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington asked, what innovation there is to bring forward that investment. Sadly, Torbay has been kicked into the long grass until the mid-2030s. The staff are our most important asset, and they deserve that investment much sooner.

[Matt Western (in the Chair)]

The next speaker will have five minutes. Thereafter, I am afraid I will have to drop to four minutes.